Descriptions of many structures for holding fish or other small craniates during a dressing out procedure appear in the prior art. These structures generally require fastening the fish to some sort of flat surface, such as a board. Certain other disclosures show a fish held from its ends, or impaled on a bayonet associated with some additional member. While numerous prior art devices appear useful in the cleaning and dressing operation, a reduction of the considerable amount of manual handling of the fish, such as that during unclamping and reclamping of the carcass, should further facilitate the dressing process.
It has been found that the depending body portion of a fish having its head clamped in a horizontal posture may be turned to present any part of the body portion to an operator by rotating the clamped head about a horizontal axis. This procedure completely obviates all manual handling of the carcass except its attachment and removal from the holder.